Job Description – Associate Category Manager
- Job Title: Associate Category Manager
- Department: Strategic Sourcing & Category Management
Job Summary
PFI Innovation Center India is an exciting new innovation center. We're building a future that helps people live better lives longer— and we're looking for bold thinkers and team players to help us do it.
Here, you'll tackle complex challenges, collaborate with brilliant minds across the globe, and grow your career while helping millions achieve financial security.
a Purpose Driven Company – 150 Years
While the PFI brand is new to India, you'll be a part of the Prudential Financial, Inc. family. Founded in 1875 in Newark, New Jersey, we serve 50 million customers across more than 50 countries. With $1.334 trillion in assets, we're a global leader in institutional asset management. The 2nd largest life insurer in the US and the 9th largest institutional global asset manager.
At PFI Innovation Center India, you'll find a high-performance culture that's flexible, collaborative and grounded in respect. We engage with candor, take calibrated risks, and hold ourselves accountable, always focused on delivering for our customers. It's the standard we choose every day as we grow, perform, and win as one team.
We offer valuable leadership, mentoring and learning opportunities, paired with the flexibility and support to help you thrive.
Whether you're just starting out or ready to take your next step, we'll help you grow with purpose and do the best work of your career.
Global Sourcing and Procurement (GSP) organization drives enterprise-wide value by cultivating strategic supplier partnerships and elevating commercial decision-making across the business. GSP provides global stakeholders with streamlined access to best-in-class products and services, informed by robust business intelligence, deep supply-market knowledge, and a clear grasp of micro and macroeconomic dynamics. Through efficient, disciplined processes and proactive commercial coaching, GSP empowers stakeholders to make informed, value-driven decisions that strengthen the company's competitive advantage.
The Associate Category Manager role plays a critical role in enabling this mission by supporting category planning, executing sourcing activities, analyzing market and supplier data, and ensuring disciplined delivery of category initiatives. This role provides essential operational and analytical support to category leads, including maintaining accurate value pipelines, reinforcing Buying Channel compliance, and coordinating sourcing efforts across regions. Operating within a global stakeholder environment, the Associate Category Manager contributes to consistent execution of the Category Management framework and the delivery of measurable, Finance validated outcomes.
Categories of spend in scope include but are not limited to Real Estate and Facilities, Human Resources and Consulting.
Key Responsibilities
- Support category initiative execution by independently preparing analysis, drafting sourcing materials, coordinating RFx activities, and managing day-to-day follow-ups with suppliers.
- Maintain and update the category pipeline by accurately tracking initiative baselines, milestones, risks, and variance commentary, ensuring information is clear and review ready for senior leaders.
- Contribute to Category Cards and Buying Channel rules by drafting updates, assessing stakeholder feedback, and coordinating changes with Systems & Analytics.
- Perform advanced spend, market, and supplier analyses, including benchmarking, pricing trend reviews, total cost breakdowns, and initial TCO assessments to inform category decisions.
- Prepare stakeholder ready materials, summarizing sourcing insights, supplier comparisons, negotiation preparation inputs, and early recommendations for review.
- Coordinate sourcing documentation and contracting workflows, ensuring complete, accurate, and audit ready records within sourcing and CLM systems.
- Engage with suppliers and internal stakeholders to gather requirements, resolve routine issues, track performance trends, and escalate risks to the Director when appropriate.
- Collaborate with regional teams in the US, Ireland, India, Japan, and other locations to align sourcing timelines, share insights, and support consistent global execution.
- Use procurement and AI enabled tools to enhance analysis, sourcing activities, and document preparation, and identify practical opportunities for process improvement.
Qualifications
- Bachelor's degree in business, supply chain, finance, operations, economics, or a related field.
- 5-7 years of experience in procurement, category management, sourcing, or supplier management.
- Demonstrated ability to manage sourcing events, prepare negotiation materials, and contribute meaningfully to category decisions.
- Strong analytical capability, with experience interpreting spend data, benchmarks, supplier pricing, etc.
- Familiarity with procurement and contracting technologies (e.g., e-sourcing tools, CLM platforms); experience with AI enabled tools preferred.
- Proven ability to collaborate across business functions and regions, managing deliverables with minimal supervision.
Skills and Competencies
- Stakeholder Support: Provides clear, reliable guidance to business partners and category leads, ensuring compliant and value aligned sourcing actions.
- Effective Communication: Summarizes data, supplier insights, and sourcing recommendations in concise, easy-to-use formats for stakeholders and senior team members.
- Analytical Problem Solving: Interprets spend, benchmarks, and supplier information with accuracy, using data to support category decisions and justify recommendations.
- Collaboration Across Teams: Works effectively with global colleagues and suppliers, coordinating activities to support smooth and consistent sourcing execution.
- Commercial & Market Awareness: Demonstrates growing understanding of category markets, pricing drivers, and negotiation fundamentals to inform sourcing work.
- Adaptability & Learning Agility: Adapts quickly to new tools, processes, and priorities, adopting improved ways of working and embracing evolving procurement technologies.
